Ireland's top players Owen Casey and Gina Niland head the list of seeds in this week's East of Ireland Open tennis championships sponsored by Esat Telecom at Londonbridge Road.
Seeded to meet them in Saturday's finals are Robert Collins and Claire Curran but last night's action was strictly for the unseeded, with Robert Sherry of Sandycove showing the best form of all.
Sherry did particularly well to oust James Colhoun 6-4, 6-0. Michael Doran of Carrickmines was pushed to the limit in the second set by Ross Shanley of County Wicklow club. Caroline Moloney scored the most decisive win of the night, reeling off 12 games against Ciara O'Toole.
Men's singles - First round: C Jennings bt McDermott 6-3, 6-1; D Cooney bt B Keenan 6-0, 6-2; R Sherry bt J Colhoun 6-4, 6-0; M Doran bt R Shanley 6-2, 7-5; A Hosback bt A Farron Mahon 6-1, 6-4.
Women's Singles - first round: S Doyle bt P Lord 6-3, 6-3; C Moloney bt C O'Toole 6-0, 6-0; S Sheppard bt M Cathcart 6-1, 6-1; K Leonard bt A Fleming 6-1, 6-1.
Ireland's top-ranked Gina Niland won all her matches while playing for Munster in the Interprovincial tennis series in Wexford at the weekend.
In yesterday's edition it was incorrectly recorded that she was beaten by Leinster's Deabhra Kelly whom she did not play.
